Galleon (27 page)

Just as Couperin had been surprised to find that Ned was in fact the leader of the buccaneers, so Ned had been surprised to discover that Couperin, while the Governor of St Martin, was officially also the Governor General of the much more prosperous island of St Christophe, better known to the English as St Kitts. Apparently the French half of St Martin came under the rule of St Kitts.

Ned smiled, to take any sting out of his answer. “You will forgive me for asking how long
you
are going to stay here?”

Couperin shrugged his shoulders, thought for a few seconds, and considered the fact that the French and the English were friends, while out here, anyway, France and Spain were enemies.

“As you may have noticed, you are not the only visitors to Marigot…?”

“Well, intentional visitors,” Ned said. “We have sailed in, anchored, and come on shore to present our compliments.”

“True, true,” Couperin said cautiously. “But is it wisdom or accident that led you to drop your anchors so that the hill hides you from the ship in the other bay?”

Thomas laughed drily as Ned said: “Wisdom. That ship does not – at first glance, anyway – seem to be French-built. Nor does she seem to be properly anchored. The only cable we have been able to see leads out on her quarter. And, of course, she is heeled and her yards have all been sent down on deck. Is the captain a friend of yours?”

“
Touché
,” Couperin said, adding: “She is the reason why I am here and not at my office in Saint Christophe.”

And, Ned thought to himself, now is the time to stop this gentle jousting and start bargaining. “Your negotiations with the Spaniards have not been – well, they have not come to a satisfactory conclusion?”

“When a–” Couperin looked at Aurelia for help, “–a
voleur de grand chemin
?”

“A highwayman,” she said.

“Ah yes. When a highwayman aims a pistol at an unarmed person, it is less a matter of negotiation than
force majeure
.”

“Indeed it is,” Ned agreed. “You have no ships, and no guns in your battery on the hill–”

“Oh yes,” Couperin said, “we have some guns up there. Three. But the wood of the platform is rotten, and termites…”

“So you cannot fire them.”

“No, but that is not a problem.”

When Ned raised his eyebrows questioningly, Couperin said: “I mentioned
force majeure
. If we fired a gun – a single gun, even a pistol – at that Spanish ship, they would bombard the town of Marigot. Unfortunately the hill protects only a third of the town.”

“Are you sure they will open fire?”

“I have the captain’s promise,” Couperin said drily. “In writing, in fact. Do you wish to see his letter?”

Ned shook his head. “What happens now? It could take a year to get that ship afloat – if a hurricane doesn’t destroy her first.”

“Ah, yes; we pray for a hurricane! But we have not enough French ships or troops to do anything about the Spaniards, and within a week or so help will be arriving for them. From Cartagena,” he added.

“From Cartagena? Are you sure?”

“Oh yes, I am very sure,” Couperin said bitterly. “My own ship is on her way to Cartagena – has probably arrived by now – to fetch help.”

So this Frenchman was working with the Spaniards! Ned glanced at Thomas, who looked puzzled. Aurelia suddenly said something in French to Couperin, speaking so quickly and unexpectedly that Ned missed it.

When Couperin answered, using an expression Ned did not understand, Aurelia explained: “The Spaniards took the ship in which the Governor General had come over here from Saint Christophe and sent it off to Cartagena. Monsieur Couperin is marooned here – at least, until another ship arrives from Saint Christophe.”

“He wasn’t thinking of going anywhere while the Dons are aground out there, was he?” Thomas asked her, as though Couperin was not in the room.

“No, I have no plans,” Couperin said with an easy smile. “Apart from anything else, I’m hoping that when they return the Spaniards will give me my ship back.”

Does he know? Ned was not absolutely sure. If the galleon had run aground in the darkness, then the French might think she had come in from the Atlantic, from Spain, and was loaded with only an ordinary cargo. Surely they must have found out she was in fact bound
for
Spain – the men who had brought the news to Jamaica had known. Was Couperin playing some deep game? Perhaps. Had he made some bargain with the Spanish, letting them use his ship to go for help in return for a substantial reward? If so, Couperin was foolish to think that the Dons would keep to the bargain.

So – did he know the ship was almost certainly laden with gold and silver and gems intended for the King of Spain’s treasury? The more he thought about it, the more puzzled Ned became. Was Couperin a prisoner in his own island, threatened with death and destruction if he did not leave the Spanish alone so that they could send up ships to carry the bullion and gems back to Cartagena, leaving the ship herself to rot or fall to pieces on the sandbank which was clearly never going to yield her up?

Or was Couperin quietly dealing with the Dons on his own behalf, as Charles Couperin, shipowner, not Charles Couperin, His Excellency the Governor General? Had the Spanish stolen his ship – or had they chartered it? Had the Dons threatened to raze most of Marigot – or had they paid off Couperin so that the galleon was left in peace until help arrived from Cartagena?

Ned admitted to himself that he would probably have trusted Couperin but for the appearance of his deputy, who combined the shifty amiability of a dishonest horse coper with the bland deceit of a bishop. The man nodded after every statement by Couperin, as though approving it, yet Ned was far from sure the man spoke English.

So? Ned was wondering just how much to reveal to Couperin. He found he wanted to hear Aurelia’s opinion: she had an instinctive feel for people. And Thomas – he was rarely wrong. Saxby, too, seemed to be able to judge people as well as he could ships and horses.

Ned turned to Couperin and said frankly: “I would like to talk with my friends. After that,” he added by way of encouragement, “we may have a suggestion to make.”

Couperin stood up at once. “There’s no need to go out in the scorching sun,” he said with a bow to Aurelia. “Please make yourselves comfortable here. Call the servant if you wish for something to quench a thirst – that is the English phrase, isn’t it? – and I and my deputy will sit in the shade of the palm trees that you can hear rustling behind the house.”

As soon as they were alone, Thomas growled: “Is he telling the truth about his ship or spinning us a yarn?”

Ned looked at Saxby. “I believe his story that the Dons have stolen his ship to fetch help.”

He turned to Aurelia. “And what do you think?”

“I believe him, too. He’s frightened for the town – village, rather – and I suspect that every penny he owns is in that ship, which is why he’s worried that he won’t get it back.”

“And what do you think, apart from not being sure?” Ned asked Thomas.

“I trust Couperin: his deputy worries me, though: I’d be wary of telling him the time o’ day in case he stole my watch!”

Saxby said quietly: “And what do
you
think, sir?”

At that moment Ned saw the galleon again in his imagination, and the fleeting picture made up his mind for him. “I believe him.”

“You didn’t a few minutes ago,” Thomas said shrewdly.

“No, I didn’t. I thought the Dons might have struck a bargain with him.”

“What changed your mind?” Aurelia was curious.

“The galleon’s guns. Those facing the town are still run out, and from what I could see with the glass, trained round forward ready to fire. They don’t help right the ship. If Couperin had struck a bargain with the Dons, those guns would have been run in and the portlids closed – especially as these heavy tropical showers must drive in through the ports and soak everything.”

Thomas nodded judicially. “You’re right Ned – as usual. Obvious really when you think about the guns still run out, but the trouble is the rest of us can’t seem ever to be able to spot the obvious. Shall I call Couperin back?”

Once the Governor General had returned, still upset that his guests would take no refreshment, Ned said: “I wanted to talk to my friends about the reason why we have come to Marigot, and your problems.”

“Ah, my problems,” Couperin glanced at his deputy and then said: “You are a fortunate man, Mr Yorke: you have friends you can trust and with whom you can discuss your problems and your plans.” He held out his hands, palms uppermost. “I am the Governor General. The people look to me. If I asked their opinions, they would think me indecisive. I would lose their trust.”

Ned nodded sympathetically. “The buccaneers are called ‘The Brethren of the Coast’, and they elected me their leader. That’s the important thing: I can lead, but I can’t force them to follow. They follow only if they agree with my plans. If not – well, I suppose they go their own way, though it hasn’t arisen, so far.”

“But I thought there were many of you,” Couperin said. “Twenty or thirty ships. I see you have only three.”

Ned laughed and decided to tell Couperin the truth, or at least enough of it to explain why the whole buccaneer fleet was not anchored off Marigot. Couperin listened carefully and as soon as Ned finished, made a point Ned had not yet thought about.

“If your buccaneers are capturing the ships approaching Cartagena, they might catch mine. Which means – apart from anything else – that this Spaniard here gets no help…”

“Well, I promise you that you’ll get your ship back!” Ned said. “But let’s leave that aside for the moment and consider this galleon. Have you any idea what cargo she’s carrying?”

“Gold, silver, gems, I suppose…perhaps a few tons of leather, coffee, herbs. But mainly bullion. But you know that!”

Ned nodded, and Couperin glanced at his second-in-command as though inviting comment. Ned realized that the man must after all speak English.

“Why you here?” the man asked abruptly.

Ned looked at Couperin as he answered. “We are interested in the bullion.”

“But it is ours!” the man spluttered.

“At the moment it belongs to the Spaniards,” Ned said mildly. “No doubt they want to keep it!”

“But this is our island – France’s, I mean.” Couperin said. “So now the gold and silver is ours.”

Ned raised his eyebrows but said nothing.

“It stands to reason,” Couperin said lamely, as if backing up his deputy. “The galleon goes aground a few yards from one of our forts and the Spanish can’t refloat her. What are we supposed to do, eh? Leave the wreck to break up, so the gold and silver is left to the fishes?”

Thomas coughed apologetically, as though unwilling to make a point which could only cause embarrassment, like a parent trying to discipline a wayward child in front of visitors. “But the gold and silver won’t be left, will it, because the moment the Dons get back from Cartagena with your ship and a few of their own, they’ll unload all the bullion and take it away.”

Couperin nodded and grinned. “You’re forgetting that, aren’t you,” he chided his second-in-command.

The man shrugged and Ned saw that he had forgotten but was in no mood to admit it: clearly he regarded the English as the same sort of people as the Spanish, greedy folk who were standing between him and many tons of bullion – so much gold, silver and gems that it made the phrase “a king’s ransom” sound like the spare coins a royal treasurer kept slung over his shoulder in a leather purse to pay for any trifles that caught the royal eye.

And, Ned admitted to himself, the man was right about the plate: the galleon probably carried enough bullion to pay all of Spain’s expenses for another year or two, paying for its Army and its Navy, as well as anything else the King wanted (like fitting out more galleons and a
flota
to collect his wealth from the Main) and, of course, the men o’ war to protect them from the enemies waiting just over the horizon…

Couperin suddenly stood up and began pacing back and forth across the floor, the inch-high heels of his boots thudding on the planks, punctuating a silence. The seat of his tan-coloured breeches was stained from the leather of a horse saddle; his stock needed washing; the lace of his collar curled over like a dying leaf. He looked tired: not the weariness of a bout of sudden exertion but the tiredness of constant worry lasting too long.

He stopped in front of Ned so that he was looking down at him. “We have the same interest in this galleon,” he said. It was a comment and, Ned hoped, the preliminary to a proposal. “You want the bullion and so do we.”

Ned shook his head. “By ‘we’, I presume you are referring to the English and French governments. But as far as I am concerned, the English ‘we’ refers only to the three ships you see anchored out there.”

Couperin shrugged his shoulders and said ambiguously: “There’s no need for us to be particular. Gold and silver have the same mysterious magnetism, whatever one’s nationality!”

“Agreed,” Ned said, and decided the time had come to talk of definite proposals. There was no point in leading with a low card, either. “Your problem as I see it – and please correct me if I’m wrong – is that you have a plate galleon aground close to your town. You do not have the ships to capture her, and at any moment she can bombard you – as her captain has already threatened. So here in Marigot you are powerless, with your tiny battery of three guns unable to fire even a salute for fear of the recoil driving the guns through the wooden flooring.”

“That is putting it harshly,” Couperin said soberly, and then added, “but accurately, too.”

“Nor is that all,” Ned said without changing the pitch of his voice. “Not only can you do nothing about the galleon or its cargo, but within a few days the Spanish will be back to unload the ship, leaving you with an empty wreck. The only thing of any value left to you will be firewood eventually drifting up on the beach in Gallows Bay.”

“You speak frankly enough,” Couperin admitted, “but you are right. But now answer me a question: what can
you
do to get your hands on the bullion? Don’t forget the Spanish regard England and France as allies: whatever you do, they’ll bombard Marigot, and it’ll be no good me protesting that it’s nothing to do with the French!”